In 1999, Professors Tom Blundell and Chris Abell from the University of Cambridge, and Dr Harren Jhoti, formerly head of structural biology and bioinformatics at pharmaceutical company GlaxoWellcome (now GSK), founded Astex Technology to pioneer the development of a new approach to drug discovery. The company became Astex Pharmaceuticals in 2011 when it merged with SuperGen Inc., and was sold for $886M in 2013 to Otsuka Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd.

Data breakout

US$150M

Value of company in 2011, when Astex Technology merged with SuperGen Inc. and was renamed Astex Pharmaceuticals. It was later resold for US$886M

80-100

Number of Astex employees since 2003

£65M

Approximate investment funding Astex has received from major pharmaceutical companies

Their 'structure-guided fragment-based' approach, developed by Blundell and colleagues from decades of structural biology research, is now employed by many major pharmaceutical companies, including GSK, Novartis, AstraZeneca and Johnson and Johnson, alongside their traditional drug discovery programmes. It works by detecting the position and orientation of small molecule 'fragments' bound to target proteins at high resolution using X-ray crystallography; these fragments can then be modified to create novel drug precursors.

Astex has used the approach to develop four potential drug compounds in-house, which are all now in Phase I to Phase III clinical trials, and has worked with industry partners to develop several others. GSK and AstraZeneca subsequently established their own fragment-based discovery programmes.

"Astex Pharmaceuticals was listed on NASDAQ [ASTX] and is one of the most successful British biotechnology companies ever," says Dr Roberto Solari, former Vice President in the Respiratory Therapy Area at GSK, and former Astex employee.